Page:Forgotten Man and Other Essays.djvu/406

398 calamity, on account of the authority which it will offer to these prophets of evil if for no other reason. Resumption with us now stands at just that point where the lightest preponderance of force may turn it one way or the other — may insure its success or cause its failure. It is a great gain to get our faces set in the right direction. It arouses the national pride in the success of resumption. It silences opposition and malevolent efforts against it. It makes it very much easier to take the requisite steps to insure success, for they involve no pain at all, nothing but economy and prudence in the national finances; the avoidance of unnecessary expenditure and the postponement for a time of certain expenditures proper in themselves. If the country needs six hundred million dollars to do its business with, then the withdrawal of a portion of the paper would simply bring gold into circulation, and resumption would be placed beyond a doubt. If the country does not want six hundred million dollars to do its business with, then we cannot sustain specie payments with that amount afloat, and we have still before us more of the experience of 1842 and 1843.